rise in tuberculosis associated with International Monetary Fund loans

[Hannah Bell]

The significance of this article as I see it is: TB is a disease highly associated with poverty, drug/alcohol use, & poor nutrition, the last two of which are also associated with poverty.

IMF loans are associated with "poor" countries - third world/indebted. Besides which, IMF often imposes "conditions" for their loans which involve cutting back on social services = reduced assistance to the poor.

Capitalism is doing great things in the FSU.


By NICHOLAS BAKALAR
Published: July 22, 2008

The rapid rise in tuberculosis cases in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union is strongly associated with the receipt of loans from the International Monetary Fund, a new study has found.

...The researchers studied health records in 21 countries and found that obtaining an I.M.F. loan was associated with a 13.9 percent increase in new cases of tuberculosis each year, a 13.3 percent increase in the number of people living with the disease and a 16.6 percent increase in the number of tuberculosis deaths.

The study, being published online Tuesday in the journal PLoS Medicine, statistically controlled for numerous other factors that affect tuberculosis rates, including the prevalence of AIDS, inflation rates, urbanization, unemployment rates, the age of the population and improved surveillance.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/22/health/research/22tb.html

[Hannah Bell]

1. Can anyone read Russian. This is allegedly a Ukraine TB hospital. If so, no wonder they have

problems.



http://infoporn.org.ua/2009/04/13/kak_boryatsya_s_epydemyeyi_tuberkuleza_v_kyeve_foto

[Altoid_Cyclist]

2. One of the few songs written about the IMF is "Call it Democracy" by Bruce Cockburn.

This was written in the mid 80's and dealt more with Central America, but it could be about any country and the consequences of deals with the IMF.

Comments by Bruce in 1990:
"Through a growing familiarity with the Nicaraguan revolution, a recognition of North-South relations began to take shape. Nicaragua, the Philippines, Chile, virtually all of Latin America really, Indonesia, emerging African countries... Wherever you look you find the same financial interests at work. Working to get rich without controls, at the expense of the poor. When the poor complain, out come the troops, and then the arms companies get rich too."


Lyrics:

Padded with power here they come
International loan sharks backed by the guns
Of market hungry military profiteers
Whose word is a swamp and whose brow is smeared
With the blood of the poor

Who rob life of its quality
Who render rage a necessity
By turning countries into labour camps
Modern slavers in drag as champions of freedom

Sinister cynical instrument
Who makes the gun into a sacrament --
The only response to the deification
Of tyranny by so-called "developed" nations'
Idolatry of ideology

North South East West
Kill the best and buy the rest
It's just spend a buck to make a buck
You don't really give a flying fuck
About the people in misery

IMF dirty MF
Takes away everything it can get
Always making certain that there's one thing left
Keep them on the hook with insupportable debt

See the paid-off local bottom feeders
Passing themselves off as leaders
Kiss the ladies shake hands with the fellows
Open for business like a cheap bordello

And they call it democracy
And they call it democracy
And they call it democracy
And they call it democracy

See the loaded eyes of the children too
Trying to make the best of it the way kids do
One day you're going to rise from your habitual feast
To find yourself staring down the throat of the beast
They call the revolution

IMF dirty MF
Takes away everything it can get
Always making certain that there's one thing left
Keep them on the hook with insupportable debt

[Hannah Bell]

3. "Wherever you look you find the same financial interests at work."

+1

[Greyhound]

4. Missed the rec-ling, here's a kick. n/t

[malaise]

5. Add malaria in Jamaica

to that list. And these fucking stupid people are heading back to the IMF.